Clown masks are out this year — so please, people, no Donald Trump costumes.FREDERIC J. BROWN / AFP/Getty Images

Happy Halloween, everyone. But I gotta ask, when did tonight’s innocent, fun festival for the kiddies turn into Ground Zero in the Culture War? Man, is that getting boring fast.

When I was a kid, basically everyone got into the spirit of All Hallows’ Eve, with the exception of a small number of humourless Christian extremists who took it all a little too literally (like they usually do about most things), thinking we’d all burn in hell for participating in what they considered Satanism.

A little later, the dentists felt they had a professional obligation to warn us of the dangers of candy to our teeth — not that anyone listened. And, of course, there were always rumours of creeps who’d put razor blades in apples or poison other trick-or-treat treats but that was, for the most part, an urban myth.

But nowadays all sorts of groups are attacking Halloween and how people celebrate it.

In schools across Canada, Halloween is being replaced with Orange and Black Day, whatever the heck that is. It apparently involves letting the kids dress up in orange and black clothes for no apparent reason. Wow, that sure sounds fun.

The justification from the PC police for all this is that Halloween has a Christian connection — All Hallows’ Eve being the night before before All Saints Day when saints are remembered and honoured. Eliminating Halloween from schools, it is justified, is about “inclusion” and not offending Canadians who don’t have a Christian background.

The obvious stupidity here is that Halloween hasn’t been primarily, or even remotely, a religious event in several lifetimes. It’s a cultural event — and a fun one at that.

For children.

So they can collect candy.

Apart from a few religious extremists who don’t represent anything close to the majority — or the professional politically correct crowd who spend all their time looking for things to be offended about — most people of all manner of religious and cultural backgrounds enjoy Halloween and view it as part of Canada’s traditions.

The solution for those who are bothered by Halloween shouldn’t be to ruin it for the rest of us. The solution for them should be not to participate. When did that become such a difficult concept for people to comprehend in this country?

The main Halloween tradition under attack by the killjoys is costumes. Sticks in the mud of various persuasions insist they have the right to tell others what Halloween getups are verboten. (I hope I didn’t offend any Germans with that bit of cultural appropriation.)

You’ve got feminists, whom I generally support, telling other women not to dress in “sexy” outfits or that girls shouldn’t be princesses; various cultural groups claiming that dressing up in their attire or mimicking them is always racist; schools banning “scary” outfits; while others say no one can go to a Halloween party dressed as Caitlyn Jenner.

Brock University in St. Catharine’s, Ont., actually published a list of prohibited costumes, if you can believe it. It’s scary that a university thinks it has the right to ban someone’s expression or that others must be protected from feeling offended. That’s simply not a right.

When I was a kid I had a fascination with the Red Baron, the First World War ace from Germany who shot down 80 planes. Naturally, I went out on several Halloweens dressed up as the blood-thirsty baron, complete with “oil” streaks on my face from my pretend Fokker Dr.1 Triplane.

Any number of people, I suppose, could have been offended: Canadian vets who didn’t think a Canadian kid should want to be the Red Baron, peaceniks who wouldn’t want anyone glorifying war or Germans upset by me pretending to be a German.

Clearly, costumes that are intentionally designed to mock others or be hurtful are bad, although I’d rather they prompt discussion rather than have them banned. But to see sexism, racism or homophobia behind every outfit is absurd and, frankly, humourless.

If we extended the attitude behind Halloween costume bans to the entertainment world, we’d lose most of the performances of Peter Sellers, Mel Brooks and Monty Python.

Over the past few weeks there has been a push to ban scary clowns, which I actually do support. So no Donald Trump masks, people. I’m serious.

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